Butternut Squash Dal
Nov 11, 2016, Updated Mar 15, 2024
Vegan & gluten-free Butternut Squash Dal. Lentils cooked with onion, tomatoes, butternut squash and lightly tempered with cumin and mustard seeds.
This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure policy.
And another easy recipe for a vegetarian Thanksgiving to end the week! This Butternut Squash Dal combines lentils with onion, tomato and is lightly tempered with mustard, cumin and curry leaves. Serve it with naan or rice! Vegan and gluten-free.
I have noticed that you guys really like dal recipes on the blog, like this Spinach Dal is quite popular on Pinterest. And so I thought I should share some more dal recipe here and since Thanksgiving is so close, it only made sense to share this Butternut Squash Dal. Honestly speaking, my list of dal recipes is pretty long. I mean I am an Indian, who grew up eating dal 365 days in the year (no exceptions!!) so of course I make them all the time. I will definitely share more in the coming months.
So for this butternut squash dal, I combined two lentils – chana dal and toor/arhar dal. Chana dal is little on the heavier side and it wasn’t made very often at my home but toor dal – that was everyday. Urgh, I never used to like it. Why would any kid like something which is served everyday for lunch? Until and unless it’s a cake of course! Anyway so for this butternut squash dal I used both and it really worked very well in the recipe. You can obviously use only chana or only toor depending on what you have in your pantry.
I don’t really add a lot of spices in my dal recipes because that way you really get the dal flavor and you don’t want spice overpowering that. So here it’s just little tempering with cumin seeds, mustard seeds, ginger and curry leaves. I pressure cooked the butternut squash along with the dal and the squash almost dissolved into the dal. In fact that way the squash flavor was so much more pronounced. If you want to bite into the squash pieces, you may pressure cook them for a lesser amount of time or you can also roast them. The squash gave a little sweet flavor to the dal which I really enjoyed. As you can see from the pictures, I kept the consistency on thicker side, you can adjust this as per your preference.
This butternut squash dal is easy to put together, is healthy, delicious and perfect for the season. I hope you guys give this a try!
Method
* Soak the chana and toor dal for 20-30 minutes. Drain water and set aside.
To a pressure cook add the soaked dal with water, turmeric powder, salt, chopped ginger and butternut squash.
Pressure cook till dal is nicely cooked and squash is completely softened. I cooked on high heat for 4 whistles and then set the heat to low and cook for additional 5-6 minutes. Let the pressure come off on it’s own and then set the dal aside.
In a pan or work, heat oil on medium heat. Once the oil is hot, add cumin seeds and mustard seeds and let them crackle.
Once the seds pop, add chopped onion, green chili and curry leaves. Saute for 2 minutes or till onion becomes slightly translucent.
Add chopped garlic and saute for a minute or two.
Now add chopped tomatoes and mix. Also add salt.
Cook the tomatoes for 5 minutes or till they soften up.
Now transfer the cooked dal to pan , add water and mix everything. Adjust salt at this point. Lower the heat and let the dal simmer for 5 minutes.
Add cilantro and lemon juice (if using) and serve immediately.
You can serve this butternut squash dal with rice or any bread of your choice. I served mine with some pulao.
* You can use ghee or butter in place of oil for the tadka/tempering. Stick to the oil to keep it vegan, the dal tastes great anyway!
* The prep time includes the soaking time of the chana and toor dal.
* Add more water for a thin consistency dal.
Butternut Squash Dal
Ingredients
To pressure cook
- ½ cup toor dal soaked for 30 minutes, also known as split pigeon peas lentil
- ¼ cup chana dal soaked for 30 minutes, also known as split garbanzo beans
- 2 & ½ cups water
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder
- 1 & ¼ teaspoons finely chopped ginger
- 2 & ½ cups butternut squash cubes from one small squash of around 800 grams
Tempering/tadka
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 1/2 teaspoon mustard seeds
- 1/4 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 1 green chili chopped
- 3 garlic cloves finely chopped
- 5-6 curry leaves
- 1 medium red onion chopped
- 2 medium tomatoes chopped
- 2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice optional
- 1-2 cups water
- salt to taste
Instructions
- Soak the chana and toor dal for 20-30 minutes. Drain water and set aside.
- To a pressure cook add the soaked dal with water, turmeric powder, salt, chopped ginger and butternut squash.
- Pressure cook till dal is nicely cooked and squash is completely softened. I cooked on high heat for 4 whistles and then set the heat to low and cook for additional 5-6 minutes. Let the pressure come off on it’s own and then set the dal aside.
- In a pan or work, heat oil on medium heat. Once the oil is hot, add cumin seeds and mustard seeds and let them crackle.
- Once the seds pop, add chopped onion, green chili and curry leaves. Saute for 2 minutes or till onion becomes slightly translucent.
- Add chopped garlic and saute for a minute or two.
- Now add chopped tomatoes and mix. Also add salt.
- Cook the tomatoes for 5 minutes or till they soften up.
- Now transfer the cooked dal to pan , add water and mix everything. Adjust salt at this point. Lower the heat and let the dal simmer for 5 minutes.
- Add cilantro and lemon juice (if using) and serve immediately.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Butternut Squash Dal
Hello,
I am following our recipe and I’m about to cook the dals in my pressure cooker, but I’m a little concerned because in your instructions you say to cook the toor and chana with the squash but not with the water. Other times I’ve made dal I’ve pressure cooked them in water. Is the squash enough to cook them with?
please add 2 & 1/2 cups water, its mentioned in the recipe card ingredients. Sorry I missed adding the word water in instructions. Going to fix that now
Can I use red lentil in place of both kinds of dal? And would pressure cooker be okay or should I do stovetop?
yes you can use red lentils and it’s up to you how you want to cook it. I always pressure cook my dals.
Amazing! Thank you so much for this wonderful recipe.
Thanks for trying Shari!
Manali, I am using red lentils instead of toor dal with the chana da l and I know the chana has to soak for several hours, (no pressure cooker 😕) but for how long do you soak red lentils, if soak tjem at all, since they are so delicate? Finally, I’m using smaller Hubbard squash which I believe may take longer to fully bake then a butternut? Well, looks like I’m asking this all SEVERAL YEARS after you published this on your site: do you still answer questions after this time? Hope so. P.S., Manali I love how flavorful and easy to make your recipes are; keep it up!
Hi Nina, sorry I was traveling hence the delayed response. Yes of course I always answer questions :). I would not soak red lentils, they cook quickly.
I was wondering if you have stovetop directions for this recipe? I’m learning how to cook, and it would be very helpful.
Thanks,
William
Hi William, you can soak the dals for 3-4 hours and then cook the dal and squash in a pan on stove-top until soft and done, will probably take 20-25 mins. Rest of the recipe will remain same.
I used the similar recipe but instead:
Pressure cooked:
2 acorn squash
2 whole spoons of minced ginger instead of what was written
1 cup Chana dal instead
In the tempering, I used
Added 2 tablespoon chopped/minced garlic instead of what was written
Added 4 teaspoon mustard seeds (because was planning to make jeera rice so to complement)
Added on top in the end:
Added 2 teaspoons coriander cumin powder
Added 2 teaspoons chili powder
Did not add water in the end…I liked the consistency thick as it was
This ended up pretty tasty. Thank you Manali 🙂
Thank you for the recipe. I loved it and I’ll make it again. A perfect fall recipe, with the squash. Warm, comforting, lots of savoury flavours and a touch of sweetness. I used red lentils and yellow split peas, since that’s what I had in my kitchen. I don’t have a pressure cooker, so I baked the squash in the oven 1 hour, cooked the split peas on the stovetop for 30 min, and added the cooked squash and lentils to the peas to cook for 30 min. Then I finished it as you said. It was delicious and healthy. Thank you!
glad to hear that Erin!
Trying this for the first time with my own spin as a soup and looking forward to dinner tonight. I had to substitute a few ingredients (i.e., dry for fresh) but the base tastes delicious so far so I’m giving this a 5 star!
Do you think I could use red lentils in place of the toor?
yes!
I have the same question!!
I answered already! 🙂
Disappointed on first try, we had high hopes. Analyzing what might of gone wrong was the fact we didn’t use a pressure cooker and cooked the dal and squash in a pan. Our dal turned out quite watery and was bland in taste. Unlike the pictures on this site, we found that we didn’t have much of a base yellow sauce for the dal/squash.
sorry it didn’t work out for you. Cooking on stove-top is definitely different than cooking in a pressure cooker. It’s quite a simple and flavorful dal. Can you tell me how much water you used and did you cook the dal first and then added the tadka (seasoning)? or did it all together?
I love this dish. Mine looked just like yours. I cooked the dal and butternut in by pressure cooker for 10 min, with 10 min. release (NPR). It was creamy and the butternut squash was very soft and yummy. This is the first time I had cooked with butternut squash. I froze the left over chunks of squash for another time. I just don’t want to stop eating it. The spice was perfect.
What is the serving size? One cup?
8 oz- 240 ml
For us Instant Pot users, if you could add a side-note to all of your pressure-cooker recipes giving instant pot pressure-level and time, that would make your recipes even more useful than they already are. For instance, the point you made above–“I would skip the chana dal if making in the IP if you want to keep the butternut squash pieces intact (because chana dal takes more time to cook and the suqash pieces would dissolve by then). If you don’t care about them dissolving them in the dal then use the same recipe and cook for 10 minutes on high pressure. If you want the squash pieces intact, use arhar/toor/split pigeon peas lentil only and cook for 5 or 6 minutes on high pressure.”–could be added to the recipe itself to make it self-contained. Thanks!
I do add these instructions for all latest IP recipes. I also add stove-top instructions. For older recipes like this one, I will go back and add the IP instructions or vice versa when I have some free time. Thanks ?
So yummy! Especially when it’s just done. Was great the next day as well, but I preferred it right off the stove. Speaking of which, I don’t have a pressure cooker, so I have pre-baked the squash first, and then cooked that and everything else in a regular pan. Thank you for the recipe! My husband who’s always been a vegetarian loved it, and we’ll put this in our meal rotation.
Glad to know Anya! 🙂
How long cook this in Instant Pot? I do not have stove top pressure cooker.
Looks very nice and tasty!
Thanks.
I would skip the chana dal if making in the IP if you want to keep the butternut squash pieces intact (because chana dal takes more time to cook and the suqash pieces would dissolve by then). If you don’t care about them dissolving them in the dal then use the same recipe and cook for 10 minutes on high pressure. If you want the squash pieces intact, use arhar/toor/split pigeon peas lentil only and cook for 5 or 6 minutes on high pressure. Hope this helps Jay!
Fab! Thanks for reply. I will do 5 or 6 minutes high pressure with toor dal only.
Wonderful! I can’t believe that I can finally cook Indian meals right in my own kitchen, thanks to your delicious recipes and easy-to-follow directions. My husband is so happy (he is Goan and I am American). Thanks again, Manali!
I am so glad to know! You are welcome Kirsten 🙂
Hi Manali, this is Fran from G’day Souffle.’ I saw your recipe photo on Foodgawker. I’d like to expand my Indian cooking recipes so I’m going to give this dal recipe a try!
Thank you 🙂
Thank you Angie!
it goes so well together! Thanks Anu!
Thanks Ami, simple dal chawal is the best 🙂
What a perfect dish Manali. I think this dal will taste good along with roti and paratha too. Thanks for sharing such a great recipe. 🙂
Yes it’s great with paratha! Thanks Puja!